Configuration of control room and vocal booth

Hello, I was looking for some assistance/guidance from the experts on this site. I have an area that is attached to my house that I would like to move my studio into. The dimensions of the area are a little awkward. Essentially there are 3 contiguous spaces of the following dimensions which together make up one long narrow room: 1. 2.68m x 2.68m with a roof height of 2.5m 2. 2.89m x 2.26m with a roof height of 2.5m 3. 4.45m x 2.26m with a pitched roof height of 3.35m I produce mainly synth based music but often record live bass and guitars and sometimes horns. I also record vocals. I was thinking of having a control room with an isolated vocal booth which could also be used for recording the bass, guitars and horns. The control room needs to be large enough for my analogue synths (5) and an electronic drum kit. Given the unusual room dimensions, I was hoping someone might be able to recommend the optimal configuration for the control room and vocal booth. Note, there are entry points (doors) at both ends of the room. Any help would be greatly appreciated. JJ

Hi JJ, There is an announcement at the top of the forum about what to do to assure getting as many responses as possible. The announcement leads to this post (click here). Actually, several people, who are experts on this forum, will most likely not reply if you don't do what is written in that post. Many others who are very helpful, will most likely not reply out of respect for the moderators' wishes. Also, without any SketchUp model of your space it is really hard to see what you have, or what could be done with it. The first section, with the dimensions of 2.68 x 2.68, is basically useless: it is square! Worst possible shape. The other two might be usable, but without seeing what you have (SkecthUp and photos) it's impossible to say. - Stuart -

Thanks Stuart, I will review the requirements you have referred me to and revise my post accordingly JJ

TAKE 2 Following on from my initial post I now attach a compressed Sketchup outline of the space I want to use together with some photo's detailing the roof. Any feedback on how best to configure a vocal booth (for vocals, bass, guitars and horns) and a control room in the available space would be greatly appreciated. The area that is currently being utilised as storage will be removed so as to maximise useable floorspace. Hope I supplied the right information this time. JJ

the first thing that comes to mind is some of John's cargo container studio designs http://www.johnlsayers.com/Studio/Mainpage/MP-Mark.htm http://www.johnlsayers.com/Studio/Pages/Clicktrack.htm http://www.johnlsayers.com/Studio/Pages/Ema.htm

So now I've had a bit of a play with Sketchup, it's addictive...and come up with the following layout for my studio. I really don't know what I'm doing. I read the information in the Recording Manual on this site and then designed my studio based on what I picked up. Would really love some feedback to see if I'm on the right track at this time with the room layout, configuration and dimensions. Any suggestions for appropriate placement of diffusors/absorbers in in the control room and vocal booth would also be great. I'm not sure about the door placement in the vocal booth. Will having the doors facing each other be a problem? I'm also concerned about the sliding glass entry doors in the control room. Would I be better removing them and putting in a standard door. Would prefer to leave as is for the natural light but not if going to make problems for monitoring. Is it necessary to float the floor in the vocal booth. Are timber floors in the control room OK? I always thought carpet was better but seems hard floors are preferred on this site. Sorry for all the questions but I'm just a muso and have never tried to build anything like this before. It's quite daunting but I'm looking forward to the challenge and need a break from music for a few weeks. BTW the drums in the control room are electronic in case any one was thinking what are drums doing in a control room. Thanks JJ

looks reasonable. i'd probably go with flat walls in the control room and add some small angled slat boxes and appropriate reflection point absorption to maximize the amount of space around the desk. if you don't need to soffit mount your speakers, you could put in slider doors so they don't have to swing and it will give you more visibility. otherwise, back to back doors with windows in them are ok. the iso-room could also have one angled wall and the rest as flat isolation walls and angled wall treatments.

JJ check out Hellfire http://www.johnlsayers.com/Pages/Castle.htm